New to Vegas 8 and interested in a true pan-and-scan tip out. I searched, but to no avail.

The Pan/crop/zoom functionality seems excellent and quite intuitive, but please instruct on pan and scan. How would I open a open a 640 x 360 project (shot at 1280 x 720) without auto resizing to fit the smaller prject size frame and then move the larger (original) behind the "window" of the project size frame.

Apologies if this has been answered here, but my search terms were only getting me zoom/pan results, not pan and scan.

I'd use Track Motion (on it's own track the 640 x 360 project) and then do whatever else you want on another track.
Look at the Creating a PIP using Track Motion series in Vol. 2 Issues 2, 3,& 4 of Edward Troxel's newsletters for suggestions as this sounds like what you want to do.

Randy, if I understand you correctly, open the Pan/Crop window on the 640 x 360 project, right-click and select "Match Output Aspect" and then size and position (and keyframe if necessary) as desired.
This video would go on track 1 and the larger (original) one on track 2 so that it's "behind" it.
Is this what you're looking for?

Thanks Mike,
If I am understanding you suggestion, I will end up with a zoomed crop that will now fill the full 640 x 360 frame (similar to a digital zoom). I am looking to avoid the digital zoom loss of quality and simpply crop a panned 640 x 360 chunk from the original 1280 x 720 file, but with now boxing. Is there a way to open a project without resizing to fit the new project size?

Thanks Mike,
No, not a box frame. Really just taking the full resolution file and cutting out a specified portion of it (say 640 x 360 from an original of 1280 by 720), but having the smaller portion become the new project size (without a box around it or without resizing the reduced portion back up to the original size).

Randy, I think I finally figured out what you've been trying to tell me :-)
When you start a new project, set the file properties (File - Properties) to the size of your newly rendered segment.
You can have Vegas do this for you when you have the Properties window open.
Click the folder icon (Match Media Settings) at the top right of this window.
Browse to the folder where your new file is, click it and click "Open".
Your project properties will now match your newly rendered file.

HI Mike,
Hmmmm, not quite there yet. Thanks for sticking with me. That last one will open the file at its correct, full proportins. What I am looking to do is open a smaller proportion frame than the original (as in the animated diagram on the wikipedia link provided above), but not resize the content of the original to fit the smaller frame. I would then like to pan and scan from the larger file.

What Randy is trying to accomplish is one of the advantages of shooting HD resolution for SD delivery. Most NLE's, and I assume Vegas can do this too, will place your full resolution material on an SD timeline. The 720x480 SD timeline now becomes a 'window' to your higher resolution stuff. It's identical to the Ken Burns effect done with high resolution stills.

Having the extra material outside the SD project window, allows keyframing side to side or up and down movement. Hence the term, 'pan and scan'.

Most of the time, this does not require a separate track, but perhaps Vegas is different this way.

Does this make it a lighter shade of mud?

@Randy,

I know what you're trying to do, but I don't know how it's done in Vegas. Surely one of our skilled Vegas users on here will chime in... perhaps Mike can explain it if he knows what you're after.

What Randy is trying to accomplish is one of the advantages of shooting HD resolution for SD delivery. Most NLE's, and I assume Vegas can do this too, will place your full resolution material on an SD timeline. The 720x480 SD timeline now becomes a 'window' to your higher resolution stuff. It's identical to the Ken Burns effect done with high resolution stills.

Having the extra material outside the SD project window, allows keyframing side to side or up and down movement. Hence the term, 'pan and scan'.

Most of the time, this does not require a separate track, but perhaps Vegas is different this way.

Does this make it a lighter shade of mud?

@Randy,

I know what you're trying to do, but I don't know how it's done in Vegas. Surely one of our skilled Vegas users on here will chime in... perhaps Mike can explain it if he knows what you're after.

regards,

-gb-

Greg,
You nailed it, and did a much better job of describing it than I. A search for pan-and-scan in Vegas 8 help made mention of nesting but offered no detailed instruction (which are required for my weak mind).

Thanks Greg. Your explanation helped a lot.
I can't offer any excuses (other than a lack of sleep lately) for being so thick-headed as to not realize what Randy wants to do.

Randy, this is no different than importing an oversized still image into Vegas for panning and/or zooming.
The procedure is as I outlined earlier.
Start your new project and set it's proerties to the desired size.
Import your (larger than normal) video clip, open the Pan/Crop window for it, right-click and select "Match Output Aspect".
When you do the "Match Output Aspect", it appears (in the Pan/Crop window) as if nothing has changed.
However, you can now do the things you want to do.

Did I finally get it right?

BTW, nesting is a completely different topic.
This feature allows you to import a veg file into another project and continue to work on it in there.
For example, I do a graduation slide show for my kids grade school each year.
The project is broken down into 5 sections.
Before nesting, I'd have to work on the entire project at once or render each section out as a separate AVI and then import all 5 in for the master render.
Now I save each section as it's own veg file and, when I 'm ready for render, import only those veg files into a new project, add them to the timeline and render.
You can still make changes to an individual veg file by right-clicking on it and selecting "open veg file" (or something along those lines).
When you save it after making the changes, the veg file in the master project is instantly updated.
A "nested" veg file comes in as one video track and a single stereo audio track, no matter how many tracks were in the original project.
At this time it doesn't support importing 5.1 projects but that's not an issue to me.

Because when I open the smaller project and import the larger video in the video is automatically resized to the smaller resolution, then it seems that the pan/crop function is merely a digital zoom effect, which would not utilize the higher resolution of the full sized image, but rather "manufacture" the extra pixels. Am I mistaken?

Because when I open the smaller project and import the larger video in the video is automatically resized to the smaller resolution, then it seems that the pan/crop function is merely a digital zoom effect, which would not utilize the higher resolution of the full sized image, but rather "manufacture" the extra pixels. Am I mistaken?

Sorry Randy but you are mistaken.
You were expecting to see what you saw in the Wikipedia link but that's not the way Vegas does things.

To quote from a recent post about this on the Sony Vegas forum:
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Pan/Crop resamples after scaling, so the images resolution is preserved as high as possible.
Track motion resamples the image to project resolution before scaling. This is bad, but it's the way it works.
-------------------------------------------------------------------

The bottom line in all of this is that anything that is a higher resolution than your project setting (like pictures from a digital still camera) can be "panned & scanned" as long as you use the Pan/Crop tool and not Track Motion.

Sorry Randy but you are mistaken.
You were expecting to see what you saw in the Wikipedia link but that's not the way Vegas does things.

To quote from a recent post about this on the Sony Vegas forum:
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Pan/Crop resamples after scaling, so the images resolution is preserved as high as possible.
Track motion resamples the image to project resolution before scaling. This is bad, but it's the way it works.
-------------------------------------------------------------------

The bottom line in all of this is that anything that is a higher resolution than your project setting (like pictures from a digital still camera) can be "panned & scanned" as long as you use the Pan/Crop tool and not Track Motion.

Happy editing :-)

Thanks Mike,

I should be used to being mistaken by now (and I sure like it a lot more when it helps me figure out something that I have been struggling with) :)

Just to clarify, In the quote above, are you understanding "the images resolution is preserved as high as possible" to be the original larger images resolution, so that the resampling process is going out to revisit the original file and take the crop from that rather than the smaller project file?